Memory Rewritten
by M-Maltesers
Summary: Matsuda’s feelings towards Light were warped, reconstituted chemical reactions in his brain, flickers of memory and fractions of self pity. Contains SPOILERS for the ending of the manga and anime.


Notes: Spoilers for the end of the manga and/or anime.

Scenes do not occur in chronological order. Also, I remember in one of the chapters of the manga, Sayu and Sachiko decide to live somewhere else for their safety but I couldn't remember where that was in the manga, so I've just chosen to have them live outside Japan, in America.

Reviews would be appreciated.

**Memory Rewritten **

**By Miki**

Light haunted Matsuda's dreams. 

He was always there, every night without fail. His voice talked in Matsuda's ears and his body took shape inside the rooms of Matsuda's mind; rooms decorated with unfinished work and nightmares from his childhood, schedules and diaries and things he needed to do, inside rooms full of lists of words that made no sense.

In his mind, Matsuda wrote on walls. He wrote names and dates, kept track of his past, scribbling it all down like a man possessed. When he woke up, he'd find his wrist sore and aching, as though he'd been replicating the movements in his dream.

Sometimes he'd wake up with slivers of recollection of the night before and other times he'd wake up with Light's face right in front of him, as though he were on the bed, kneeling over next to Matsuda, his lips a few inches away and whispering cruel things to him, the corners of his lips turned up mockingly. Matsuda would twist and turn in the bed, expecting Light to be standing there next to his window, against the morning sunshine streaming in, but when he turned his head to look, tired eyes always wide open and urgently seeking out that silhouette of the man, he always found he was alone.

The only times Matsuda didn't sleep with Light were when he passed out drunk, which happened rarely. He didn't have the time for hangovers, however much time he had for after-work drinks these days.

Sometimes Light liked to play with Matsuda's gun, asking him why he hadn't shot him in the head; why he hadn't blasted a hole through his brain and taken him out quickly.

What ate most at Matsuda was that he had tried. Impulsively, instinctively, he'd reached for his weapon; a cold, mechanic thing that took out allies in the same way it took out foes.

Light was not… an ally. He had never been. He had been a double-crosser and someone who in death had denied Matsuda any kind memories he'd ever had of him. They were all warped now, reconstituted chemical reactions in Matsuda's brain, flickers of memory and fractions of self-pity at times.

The worst times were when Matsuda felt pity for Light, because he knew it was wrong, to want to feel something other than anger, other than disappointment.

There was irony in the way that Light had died and Light had just enough humour to laugh about it in Matsuda's dreams. His was a dry cackle that echoed on and on; a sound that Matsuda woke up to more mornings than not.

(S)

When Light died, Matsuda's memories were rewritten before his eyes.

Not before, when Light told them he was Kira, and not after when Near approached the body and squatted down next to it, eyeballing it and holding out an accusing finger. From behind, he looked like L, squatting still as though his body was frozen as his mind thought.

The Light who Matsuda had known had died that day. Matsuda shot at him, but it wasn't the bullets from his gun that killed him; it was his encountering a little black notebook years before that had set him on his journey towards death.

Matsuda knew that, but his dreams still haunted him.

_Light_ haunted him.

Light played with him from the other world. He laughed and taunted, was seventeen and wide-eyed one moment and twenty-three the next, lying on the ground in the warehouse and begging Ryuk for his life. Matsuda knew he would have known it was useless. Shinigami didn't give the gift of life; they brought death instead. The fact that death was equal would have been cold comfort for Light.

Matsuda found that out afterwards when Ryuk returned to the Shinigami world. He'd had his fun for the moment, though how long his moment would last was anyone's guess.

To know that another world besides theirs existed; to know that creatures existed who peeked at their lives and played with their deaths…

It was no wonder Matsuda contemplated seeing a shrink more than once.

(S)

Their headquarters was clean. A scarf sat on one of the sofas and Mogi pushed it off the arm as he sat down heavily, hands rubbing at his face.

"Someone should tell his mother."

"And Sayu."

Matsuda didn't know who spoke, only that his was the next voice to speak.

"I'll do it!" he said, loudly, quickly, standing stiffly still and waiting for someone to object.

No one did.

Matsuda almost instinctively looked around for Light to seek his opinion, but Light wasn't there. That was right, Matsuda remembered; Light was the reason they were all in here now like this.

His body would already have been dealt with and the scene cleared. A report would have to be prepared for the coroner, but there were more than enough witnesses to testify as to the nature of his death.

_Cardiac Arrest. Victim was aged: 23. _

The scarf Mogi had pushed to the ground was Light's. Matsuda wondered why he had left it here so carelessly when he was usually so picky about everything around him – belongings included. But then, Matsuda realised, Light had planned to come back.

Whether he came back with or without them, _he_ had planned to live past today.

Matsuda's heart ached with sadness for a short moment. He pictured the fresh-faced boy he'd met six years ago and felt only disgust and anger with himself, shivers running over his skin when he thought of Light's face and the cruel smile that had graced it just hours before.

(S)

The first time Matsuda dreamt of Light, it was on the airplane over to see Sayu and Yagami Sachiko. The clouds outside his window were the white of his shirt, starched and pressed, but the blue of the sky turned to a dull red behind his eyelids when he closed his eyes.

Light's tie was pulled loose and his shirt unbuttoned halfway down. He sat in L's seat, feet arched as he squatted on the chair and hunched over the keyboard, a bowl of sugar cubes to his right. When he turned towards Matsuda, blood trickled down the underside of his hand and Matsuda could see it seeping into the white of his shirt.

"Matsuda," he said, "we're out of sugar."

"No we're not," Matsuda answered. "It's right there. It's right next to you."

Light shook his head. "That's _L's_ sugar. I need my own."

"But you don't eat sugar," Matsuda said. His suit was itchy.

Light's eyes were big, light brown, piercing in the way he stared at Matsuda. So focused.

"Yes I do," Light pointed out, eyes steady and tone insistent. "You're getting confused Matsuda."

Matsuda woke up abruptly and stared wide-eyed at the back of the seat in front of him. He reached out and pulled his window shade down, sliding the plastic as far down as it went. Then he called for a hostess and ordered a glass of wine.

It was a dark red and it nauseated him to look at it, but he drank it nonetheless and ordered another.

The only good thing about first class was that they never gave you dirty looks for ordering more than you were worth. He could have flown economy, but it was protocol; police didn't need to be getting DVT from sitting in squashed-up seats on long-haul flights.

The largeness of the seat made Matsuda feel as though he was missing something, but he filled up the emptiness inside him with glasses of red wine until a gentle haziness overtook him and Light began to blur at the edges, seeping back into the walls of Matsuda's mind.

(S)

"You must be tired," Sayu smiled. "You had to come here all by yourself and it must have been a long flight."

Matsuda nodded and then shook his head. She looked tired herself, dark rounds under her eyes the result of little sleep and too much stress, but Matsuda could hardly blame her.

Her mother looked equally tired, but her smile was bright when she realised who was at the door, and Matsuda's heart twisted when he realised how much she reminded him of Light.

"I'm sorry we couldn't pick you up at the airport," Sayu apologised. "You came at such short notice that Okaa-san couldn't get time off work and I had a study meeting to go to."

Matsuda shook his head again, struck dumb by the expression on her face.

Why had he never noticed before? She looked so much like Souichirou.

So, so much like her father.

So where on earth had Light found it in him to murder so systematically? Where had his mind become so disfigured and sick?

(S)

Matsuda could practically count on his fingers the number of times he'd been out with Light for any reason other than work over the last six years.

They'd been out together when Light had turned twenty. The obligatory celebration had been held at a restaurant near to their headquarters and Sayu had said a few words for her older brother. Matsuda hadn't heard most of what she'd said – he'd been too busy admiring her dress – but he found himself recalling the night on the flight back to Japan.

Light had been nonplussed about the event that night and Matsuda had teased him when they'd left the restaurant, not being able to help it.

He grinned, buoyed by their time out of the headquarters, buoyed by the alcohol in his system and happy that the night was so clear and crisp. The stars were a bright white and the city lights flashed intermittently; signs advertising clubs, pubs, cinemas, restaurants, signs of life.

Light was too serious, Matsuda thought.

He reached over, tugging at Light's tie to catch his attention. "Hey," he grinned, not letting go. "Aren't you going to loosen up a bit? Hit a few clubs tonight?"

MisaMisa was on her phone and she frowned at Matsuda, as though telling him to take his hands off her Light, so Matsuda did so.

"Clubs? At _your_ age?" Mogi interjected, giving Matsuda a funny look. "Aren't you too old for that?"

Matsuda startled. "Of course not!" he objected, pointing to his face. "Do I look old?"

Mogi pretended to analyse him, stroking his chin in thought. "You look old enough to be Misa's father."

Matsuda stood still, jaw gone slack. "I do not!" he protested loudly, laughing despite himself. Then, realising Mogi might actually not be teasing, he panicked. "Uh, I mean, hey! Hey! You don't mean that, do you?"

"Of course he does," Misa said, sticking out her tongue and latching onto Light. She was free of her phone call.

Matsuda found himself shoved out of the way a little and he glanced at Light a little ruefully. It was well and good to be in love when you were young, but he wondered if Light didn't sometimes feel constrained by Misa. She was so… clingy.

Light seemed to interpret his look differently, because he offered Matsuda a slight smile. They'd be up early in the morning again. Their big night out could wait until later, he said. Work always came first.

(S)

In Matsuda's mind, Light's smiles turned so very quickly into sneers. His brain processed his memories as though using the find and replace function in a text document.

Ctrl + F.

Every smile replaced with a sneer. Every frown replaced with a look of contempt. Hands gesturing found strings to play with and Light's little puppets danced along the keys of the keyboard; Matsuda among them with his painted white face and painted red smile.

Matsuda wished sometimes he could simply erase his memories of Light. He wished he could simply delete the data in his brain like ones and zeros on a hard drive. But his head didn't work that way and he knew that better than anyone.

He was tired. They all were, even Mogi and Aizawa, the two who should have been the most relieved among them.

Matsuda almost wished he'd have had the scepticism or at least the creativity to see things from L's point of view. To see Light as L had seen him. His 7 chance that Light was Kira had been correct, but when Matsuda remembered that L and Light had both attended university together and played on the tennis courts with each other, he found it even harder to understand how L could ever have seen Light as Kira; how he had seen past such a perfected façade.

Light was the kid who'd played tennis, dated Misa, been an older brother to Sayu and been his parent's son. He was the boy Matsuda had seen through cameras before he'd seen him face to face, and he was the man Matsuda had worked with – and for – without question.

He'd _defended_ Light when everyone else had doubted him, and to the last, Light had believed Matsuda sympathised with him. He'd singled him out, when he was down, bleeding, accused, cornered, tricked… When he was clinging and pleading and right over the edge of his sanity.

Matsuda _couldn't_ sympathise with a killer. His conscience didn't allow him to. Someone who had caused his own father's death was, to him, someone he could never see in the same way ever again.

Kira was the shadow they'd been chasing, but in the end, it turned out that the shadow had slept wide-awake on their doorstep and uninvited the entire time.

(S)

Sayu's face was a face of shock when Matsuda finally got the words out of his mouth.

She dropped her tea and the cup bounced on the floor, brown water spilling in an arc on the white carpet.

Matsuda reached to pick it up and set it back on the coffee table, closing his eyes for a moment as he considered his next words.

Yagami's hands twisted themselves tightly around each other, her fingers pressing tightly against blue veins under her skin.

"How did he die?" she asked, her voice sounding tight.

Matsuda swallowed, feeling bile rising in his throat. He felt sick.

"He… was killed by the Death Note," he answered. He'd rehearsed this scene in his head on the plane trip on the way over, but seeing Sayu and Sachiko in their living room, personal items strewn around and a sweater on the sofa next to Matsuda, cushions behind his back…

Somehow it all managed to undo him from the inside out.

(S)

Matsuda had no photos of Light.

It was strange to see Yagami pull out an album; all family possessions which once had belonged to four people and now only belonged to two. Matsuda had thought all of their family photos would have disappeared at the beginning of the Kira investigation, but Yagami gave him a slight smile and put a finger to her lips.

Matsuda wasn't in the mood to ask her why these existed, but he was almost sorry they did.

When Yagami flipped open the first page, Light smiled at Matsuda.

He was six and wearing his school uniform, a tie around his neck and a bag on his back. He was so cute and so typical of a child his age that it made Matsuda's heart hurt.

He put his hand to his mouth before he could stop himself, pressing his fingers against his cheek, palm covering his lips and hiding the words he wanted to say.

_Why? _

He must have stared at the photos for longer than he'd meant to. There were hundreds in the album, and in every one, Light was doing something. Whether he was reading or doing jigsaw puzzles, out in the garden or inside, Matsuda felt as though he was peering into a parallel world.

Sachiko gave Matsuda a photo as he left, pressing a white envelope into his hand and smiling. "It's all over now, isn't it. I just thought… you'd like something to remember him by."

Then she hesitated, leaning against the door and licking her lips as she thought. "He liked you, Matsuda. I think… Sayu does too, so if you'd like to keep in contact…"

Matsuda nodded, bowed and took his leave.

(S)

Cleaning up the headquarters was an unreal task.

Matsuda didn't help much, preferring to sit on the sofa until that too was moved. Even Mogi commented on his frown, telling him it made him look too thoughtful, but the joke went unnoticed by Matsuda.

He took the task of giving Light's belongings to Misa; delivering them to her in a single box; all that Light had left in headquarters.

Matsuda nearly kept the scarf for himself, but in the end found himself handing that over too, not having much to say to Misa except to comfort her, trying and failing to pull her from her shell.

She was empty.

Just like he was.

(S)

"So…" Matsuda squatted down in front of the grave stone, feet planted firmly on the ground but his head in the clouds.

His mind was fuzzy. He still wasn't sleeping well and it was only at four AM that he'd decided he'd pay Yagami Souichirou a visit.

Perhaps it had been Light talking to him in his half-conscious state that had put the idea into Matsuda's head. Perhaps he still hadn't forgiven himself for being so naïve and allowing himself to be sucked into Light's game.

The stone in front of him with its name engraved was just one of millions of results of that game.

Matsuda scratched at his scalp with both his hands, groaning. Where should he begin talking about this?

"I think… I'm going crazy."

Good. That was a good start. It was an _honest_ start at least.

In Matsuda's mind, Light was six years old and looking slightly wary, not liking the fact that Matsuda was talking to Yagami. Not liking the way Matsuda was walking dangerously closely to spilling secrets even where no one could hear him.

Was he going to tell his father on him? Would Matsuda really do that to him? They were supposed to be _friends_, weren't they? _Friends_ didn't do that, Matsuda.

Light pulled out a notebook, scratching in it with a pen which wasn't his, eyes watching Matsuda.

(S)

The photo didn't help Matsuda at all. If anything, it made things worse.

It sat in his desk drawer where he could see it whenever he wanted to open the drawer and look.

He'd started writing a few letters to Sayu, but it seemed strange to keep in contact with her at all, now that they had no strings linking them to each other. At one time, Matsuda knew he'd have jumped at a chance to know her better, but that was back when he'd also felt limited by his links to Yagami and to Light.

He was a grown up, and Sayu had still been a child. He had _obligations_ to fulfil and limitations to take note of, and he'd accepted that. Now it was Light he wished he'd gotten closer to.

Funny how things came full circle sometimes.

When he'd met Light, he'd thought him brilliant. He was his father's son in every way possible; sharp, quick-witted, bright, intelligent, so promising, his parents' pride and joy.

Matsuda had always admired him. He'd thought Light was someone who would change the world, and he _had_; he'd just done it in a way Matsuda had never imagined of him.

Matsuda's memories were becoming warped once again.

(S)

"You picked _this_?" Light asked, displeasure in his voice.

Matsuda grinned. "Oh, come on! You don't like this one?" he asked, waving the remote control at Light and flicking on the movie info page, pausing the opening credits. "It's got MisaMisa's friend in it," he pointed out.

He was probably being too enthusiastic for what Light seemed to think was a bad movie, but Matsuda couldn't care less. It was one of their earliest nights in a while and Light had promised to watch a movie with him.

Going to the cinema was out of consideration, but Matsuda had downloaded a movie online and the TV at headquarters was as good a place as any to watch it. He'd even dragged the sofa across and thought to find some extra cushions.

Light sat down on the opposite side of the sofa, crossing his legs immediately, arms crossed not a minute later.

He frowned at the screen and Matsuda hurriedly un-paused the movie.

"If you don't like it-"

"It's fine," Light said, and looked a little awkward. He loosened his tie.

Matsuda had already pulled his off and had his socks up on the sofa, legs tucked up to keep them warm. "Are you hungry?" he asked.

Light's answer was a quick 'no'. They had only eaten an hour before; Chinese takeout eaten with wooden chopsticks in polystyrene boxes – some things never changed – so it was the answer Matsuda had expected.

Matsuda kept waiting for messages to interrupt their movie – phonecalls or text messages, emails or video conferences. None came, and in the end, he did have to admit it was a bit of a crappy movie, even if the girls in it were cute as anything. So cute they reminded him of high school.

Matsuda thought they'd have been the type to make him hard back then. He'd jerked off more than once to thoughts of his classmates, and while it made it hard to look at their faces properly the next morning, it hadn't stopped him from doing it again that night.

Light dozed next to him, sitting up straight, his head bent forwards and his hair falling awkwardly.

Matsuda wrapped his arm around Light's shoulders and pulled him across, giving up his own shoulder for a pillow.

When Light didn't wake up, Matsuda breathed a slight sigh of relief, surprised at his own gesture.

When he was sleeping, Light almost looked his age, lips neither frowning nor smiling, eyelashes fluttering as he dreamed behind closed eyes.

When the climax of the movie hit, Matsuda jumped more as Light moved against him than when explosions rocked the screen and the sound system. Light just snuggled in closer to Matsuda, hand resting on Matsuda's leg, cheek still squashed against Matsuda's bony shoulder, making Matsuda's heart flutter like he was a kid again.

(S)

The night of the first anniversary of Light's death, Matsuda went to bed early.

He'd considered hanging out on the couch – alone – with a can of beer. But as it turned out, he really needed to go shopping because the fridge was practically empty and he had practically nothing to eat either.

He brushed his teeth, changed his clothes and climbed into bed with a National Geographic. The pictures of baby leopards and lions made him feel better.

His morning's conversation with Aizawa replayed itself in his head but Matsuda decided he couldn't linger on it any longer.

Not tonight anyway. It marked a year since the Kira investigation had come to a close, and a year since Light had died, but it also marked a year since Matsuda had stopped sleeping alone and started sleeping with Light.

He'd remember Light for the person he was; for _every aspect_ of the person he was.

Matsuda couldn't wipe his memory. He couldn't edit it or wish he had someone else's memories of Light. He couldn't wish to be ignorant of the things Light did. After all, he worked on that case alongside Mogi, Souichirou, Light and Aizawa. He'd seen L die and he'd seen Light become the second L.

Near was now the third L.

Time had passed and it had changed them all, and there was no use going back to try and change things. The fact that Light had become a murderer had never been Matsuda's fault but he still sometimes blamed himself for not seeing the pieces of the puzzle that L and Near had; for not being perceptive enough to question things for himself.

But perhaps that was the beauty of life.

You lived. You learnt. You learnt from your own experience and you learnt from others. You learnt to see things differently and to see things the way other people saw them.

Matsuda had forgotten to shut the curtains in the room and he fell asleep staring out the window.

In the morning, his eyes snapped open in the six AM darkness, his hands and arms twisted around his sheets.

He swallowed hard, breathing out and then breathing in once, twice, then loud enough that he could hear himself.

He shifted one arm to pinch the other, glad for the pain that suddenly shot up his veins, hot and sharp.

He was alive.

He squeezed his eyes closed and then opened them again, glancing across at the window quickly to see a clear line of grey where the gap in the curtains was.

Light was liquid and air in his dreams.

Matsuda was flesh and blood; still solid, still here.

He knew he'd dreamt of Light again, but this morning, he couldn't quite remember what he had dreamed about or what they'd talked about but as Matsuda sat up in bed, he realised his skin was clean.

He wasn't sweaty. His hands weren't clammy and his heart wasn't beating out of his chest.

It was okay. _He_ was okay.

(S)

Matsuda sat in the Yagami family's old sitting room. Yagami had gone upstairs to fetch some paperwork he'd misplaced and Matsuda was sitting waiting for him.

He stood up, deciding to stretch his limbs, when movement from the doorway caught his eye.

A little boy stood there, moving out of the shadows as Matsuda moved closer.

He was short, slightly chubby. He could only have been three or four and no older, and Matsuda's heart clenched suddenly, tight with a feeling of fondness he couldn't understand. He'd never met this child before, but he had to be Yagami's son.

"Hello," he said, awkwardly.

The little boy didn't speak, so Matsuda squatted down to be closer to him, and tried again.

He got a nod in response this time. "Hello."

Matsuda grinned and the little boy stepped closer, little white socks wrinkled at his ankles. They had lace on them, and Matsuda nearly snorted, wondering if Yagami or his wife had expected a girl instead of a boy.

"What's your name?" Matsuda asked.

"Light."

"Light?" Matsuda blinked, falling onto his bottom. "Oh, that's an unusual name."

"What's your name?" Light asked.

Matsuda smiled, chuffed to be asked in response. "I'm Matsuda Tota, but you can call me Matsu-chan if you want, Light-chan."

Light stared at him.

Matsuda tried to hold his smile, hopeful.

Light's eyes fell on the pocket of his jacket suddenly and he pointed. "Are you my dad's friend?"

Matsuda nodded. "I work with your dad, yes."

Light tilted his head and Matsuda wondered if he was re-analysing him in light of that statement.

"So you're a cop?"

Matsuda nodded again, smiling. "Yup. I'm a cop just like your dad, except I think he makes a better one than I do," he laughed, confiding a little secret in Light.

Light nodded. "I want to be a cop too."

Matsuda blinked, surprised at how precocious this child was, and at the sudden determination on his face, as though he expected Matsuda to deny him this.

Instead, Matsuda ruffled his hair, grinning. "That's a good thing to want to be. It's a fun job, and you get to do good things."

Light nodded. "I want to do good things."

Matsuda's heart ached unexpectedly, the simple, innocent words twisting a knife inside him even though he didn't understand why.

"You do that then, Light-chan," he smiled, ignoring the pain in his chest. "Who knows? Maybe one day you and I can work together."

Light nodded. "But you'll be old by then, Matsu-chan, won't you."

Matsuda laughed. "Yes, well I might be old by then, but I won't be dead." Then he ran his hands through Light's hair again, marvelling at the brightness of his eyes and the clarity of the black pupils there.

"I'll still be around then. Trust me."

.fin.


End file.
